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Me: I went to Mel’s Diner the other night and got the fish sandwich. They put mayo on it, which I thought was gross.

My Friend: Really? You don’t like that? That’s one of my favorites. I like their fries, too.

Me: Oh yeah. The thick-cut ones? Those are good.

My Friend: Good times, good times.

Now the same conversation, on the internet:

Me: I went to Mel’s Diner the other night and got the fish sandwich. They put mayo on it, which I thought was gross.

Commenter#1: I can’t believe you don’t like the mayo you must be retarded.

Commenter#2: Why would you forbid them from putting mayo on things! Are you some kind of fascist?!?!

Commenter#3: I would have taken that sandwich and shoved it in the waitress’ face if she was ever stupid enough to do that to me!

Commenter#4: It was tartar sauce you dumbass.

Commenter#5: You’re wrong. The mayo is what makes that sandwich great. If you’re not smart enough to realize that maybe you should stick with McDonalds!

Commenter#6: Then don’t eat it. DUH! Nobody had a gun to your head.

Commenter#7: If you bothered to learn about other culture’s you would realise that not everyone likes the same thing you do in other countrys they put mayo on all kind of things dont be so close minded.

I love… er… hate the way that happens online. You say X and whatever X is, a bunch of people will take X to the most extreme level, and pretend that what you really said was X to the nth power. You say you don’t like Mayo? Obviously you think that all Mayo should be destroyed and anyone who likes Mayo is a facist pig. You say that someone cut you off in traffic and it annoyed you? Obviously you’ve got anger problems and you probably cut him off first and you really deserved it because you’re a bad driver anyway.

How long until someone accuses you of thinking that nobody should ever comment or that you hate all disagreement here?

Hahaha, that is so incredibly true. On one forum I visit, any time anyone mentions anything they did in a certain situation, there are inevitably a bunch of people ready to criticise them, abuse them, and tell them how they should have done things differently.
Someone actually recently commented that he’s surprised there have never been any punch-ups at forum meet-ups.

I agree with you, in that the internet can be a bit of a feral knee-jerk kinda place, but the difference there is that in the first case, you told something to your friend, and in the second case you plastered your opinion on a billboard in downtown New York, along with your phone number for people to ring you with their response. You gotta expect to collect more than a few nutters that way…

It’s so easy to imagine comments #8, 9, 10, etc. and it doesn’t get any better, does it? :)

This is the downside of having (generally) no personal consequences to being impolite, or worse. No risk of getting punched in the face = thousands and thousands of anonymous, snarky people that would never talk to someone like that in person.

Dev Null, that’s not accurate at all. A billboard in downtown NY is unavoidable. You don’t have to seek it out- you see it by accident whenever you’re out walking around. Do some people come here by accident? Sure. But this is still Shamus’ site. He’s kind enough to share it with the public, but it’s a conversational. He interacts with people who visit here. It’s more like he’s holding an open-house party and has a posterboard up with this on it.

Maybe we do have to expect people to be jerks in cases like this, but we sure as heck shouldn’t have to. It’s disappointing.

On the one hand, I agree with you mostly.
On the other hand, there’s a bit of a difference, which is that when you take the time to post it on the internet, you’ve effectively said “Hey, I think this is Important, and I want to tell a lot of people about it.” Kinda like if you scrawled your Anti-Mayo Manifesto on a napkin, xeroxed it, and tacked it up on the street posts. ;D

Shamus – you’ve only been in my feed reader for 6 months or so (I reckon), but you seem to be rapidly heading for “Internet superstar” territory. Two of your very recent posts have hit 70+ comments, which means that you are going to be Scott Adams before you know it.

Which means that a non-zero percentage of your commenters will be trying to win their own personal internet arguments. Try to cultivate a smug feeling of superiority as you delete their posts.

At first I read the Commenter sections as “COMMONER”, all to the increased hilarity of the text.
That’s sad but true, though. I attribute it to the herd syndrome – had there been 7 people at the same time in real life, it would have gone pretty much the same.

Including “first” would, in many cases, make our sample thread inconveniently long. We’d probably have to resort to a regular expression like ^.*[fF]irst.*$ to avoid this. That might eat up some comments that are technically interesting but happen to mention the word “first”, but we’ve got to nuke it from orbit, just to be sure.

I think people just tend to have a hard time disagreeing reasonably and seriously considering various ideas. By this I do not mean having everyone nod heads and “validate” everyone else’s opinions, but really to exchange opinions frankly but civilly while thinking. It seems that, to avoid strained tempers, we often just drift into like-minded groups or tend to keep our chats uncontroversial.

If you knew that your friend had very passionate feelings about mayonnaise, you might be cautious discussing the subject. However, on the Internet you might take a stand on mayonnaise, expecting it to be a subject that doesn’t offend sensibilities, only to find that a minority with strong pro- or anti-mayonnaise sentiments are disproportionate responders.

Still, I’ll grant that you probably need the relative anonymity, lack of empathy-inducing “human” social cues, and already pathological social context to get from there to Youtube comments.

As if I haven’t abused patience enough already, since the thread’s already about flaming I’ll express my hope that Shamus doesn’t become Scott Adams. I actually like most of what Shamus says, even when I don’t agree; I’d much sooner have it than “philosotainment” or whatever that guy calls it.

Now that I’ve checked the last thread, I do hope this isn’t about that. Despite some exceptions, most of the comments on each side seemed fairly reasonable. Furthermore, a substantial portion, maybe even most, agreed with the original statement (as of this point, with 70ish comments), unlike this sample. And, unlike the mayo conversation, the selected topic for that one could be expected to produce spirited differences of opinion.

Calling names and producing a new thread to make fun of forum participants, if that was the idea, doesn’t seem too classy either. (Still, it’s not as if I haven’t said worse.) However, I suppose this thread isn’t necessarily meant that way at all, and could just be expressing an eternal truth of which online disagreements remind us.

wrg: It’s interesting that you brought up Scott Adams. I avoid his site because it always turns into “people who don’t like mayo are secretly child molesters” sort of territory. I can expect that sort of thing when “mayo” is replaced with “religion” or “homosexuality” or other things that provoke strong reactions. What surprises me is how often I get those sorts of reactions here, when musing about various esoteric subjects. But yeah, SA’s site is way worse. (And a good bit larger.) (And he seems to provoke that sort of thing on purpose. I can’t imagine what motivates the guy. If I had his money, you wouldn’t catch me provoking and then moderating a flame war. Sheesh.)

Yes, this post is a response to some of the more ridiculous comments in the Prey post on killing kids. As you said, there were indeed many interesting comments – both from people who agreed with me and from people who weren’t bothered by it at all. But there were also a couple of crazy people in there, and their comments prompted this post. I deleted a few of the worst that were directly insuting to me or were just gibberish trolling. You’re right: This wasn’t that classy. I’m just trying to make light of a frustrating situation.

I can definatly understand the frustration you’re talking about Shamus. In several of the message boards I’ve been on over the years I have seen prime examples of this type of behavior.

Let’s not limit ourselves though. Anonymity isn’t just for message boards. I’m a big fan of MMO’s (my first was EQ, my current is WoW) and I’m constantly amazed at some of the things people put out there in the general chat channels. Because there is no real threat of punishment, or just no understanding of online social niceties, some people will espouse anything that crosses their minds.

Personally, I enjoy this forum much more than any other I’ve been on because many of the posters write well thought out and very readable posts, regardless of what side of the issue they take.

If it makes you feel any better, look at it from a customer service standpoint. No matter how hard you try, you will always have a 10-1 ratio of complaints. Only one person in ten will give positive feedback (think Wal-Mart … 10-1 was the standard feedback ratio when I got out of the retail customer service gig). Looking at it that way, you’re way ahead of the curve :)

Best comment ever. We’re about to launch a web app and we’re still trying figure out how to handle the ‘dumb-ass quotient’.

It all comes down to my “Punch in the face” theory. There’s little to no risk of a punch in the face when you’re a jerk on the internet.

That theory, by the way, also explains why women get to be such jerks in a business environment. No fear of the punch in the face. (Not that I’m advocating that. Ever. I’m just saying.) Guys will edit themselves when talking to other guys because they fear the punch in the face. It’s primal, but it works.

I’m reminded of Red Vs. Blue’s video, “Real Life Vs The Internet,” where they compare, as you can well guess, events the way they occur in RL as opposed to how they occur on the internet.

At one point, they compare purchasing music, and someone is asking about the latest Creed CD on the internet. After a parody on piracy, one “user” randomly joins the conversation with, “Creed SUCKS! I HATE you! And I HATE the bands you LIKE!”

This sort of behavior is because fast text-based telecommunication forces simplified perceptions. You can’t see or hear anyone, you can’t get any sort of context from people who are strangers. All you know about them is that they mentioned mayo.

And yet, here you both are, on the inter nets, and since (obviously, if you are reading a thread about mayonnaise) you have nothing better to do with your time, you respond. Again, all you have to show on the internet is what you post, so you have to make it count. Wanna lay odds that what people say on the internet is going to be, on average, more strongly worded, more polarized, more inflammatory, more attention-grabbing? Because in the end, that’s the only reason to be LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME it’s a cry for help, really.

“Hippocrit! How can you like some condomints, but hate others? Once you cross the condomint line, it’s all the same.

Hippocrits like you (who recognize degrees of sin) make me want to puke. You did something wrong once makeing you as wicked as anyone else. You have no right to cast any dispersions.

Because if I can claim moral equivalence among everyone, nobody can point out my failings”

I have a feeling this was aimed at me. I can appreciate (and give!) a good snark, but I’d like to state that I never made anything personal, or said anything about anyone’s rights to do anything.

Anyway, this is the internet, not a conversation with your friends. When you post public statements, you should expect the public to respond, be it without bias or with a bias so extreme it makes you wince.

Oh, and I agree with the above: “First”-ers are the bane of the popular internet forum. I just don’t even see the point. In some of the games I play, I really hate having to wade through pages of “First!” posts to get to the real discussions on the forums.

Roy swatted my bad metaphor and responded:It’s more like he’s holding an open-house party and has a posterboard up with this on it.

Good point. He has left the front door open and put an ad in the paper telling anyone who likes to drop by though; his message is out of sight, but freely available. In real life that advertised open-house party would net you your friends, maybe a curious neighbor, the door-to-door salesman who happened by, and homeless crazy people. Possibly some underage kids trying to scab drinks. Maybe most of us are Shamus’ (philosophcal) neighbors in that we’re interested in a lot of the same things, but the internet is also full of salesmen and crazy people with little demand on their time.

Hey Shamus, was the fish breaded? Cause I hate that. Why put a breaded fish patty between two slices of bread? It’s like the Japanese noodle sandwich, I just don’t see the point.

But I do like mayo. And special sauce. I have been known to get a bacon cheeseburger and dip it into a bowl of thousand island dressing prior to each bite. I bet that makes some of you out there cringe, eh? But I can’t do that shit anymore. My wife expects me to outlive her, even though she’s younger than me. So if she saw me try to dip my burger she’d probably slap it out of my hand.

I had a pretty good fish sandwich once that was an ahi tuna steak with wasabi mayo on a toasted french roll.

If I’m not mistaken, it’s this sort of thing described above that drove USS Clueless into a mountain redoubt full of anime. The internet seems to be full of people who agree, but their inclination to do so is minimal compared to the motivation of someone who disagrees and feels their favorite condiment needs to be defended in terms of HAHA MAYO RULZ U 5UX0R5, etc.

Commenter#8: The real power and beauty of the fish sandwich is that if you don’t like someone else’s fish sandwich, you can rebuild it the way you want. Get the sandwich source, build the sandwich you want, and enjoy it, otherwise, STFU.

In the words of a common but I think anonymous quotation, “Politeness is the grease on society’s machinery.”

Internet forums are a kind of social machinery that need no grease, so they get sand and grit instead. “Sand” being the deliberate trolls, and “grit” being just how disagreement can be typed without any rational thought whereas agreement or compliment both require at least understanding what someone said.

In my experience, internet discussion forums are not lacking fistcuffs so much as the minor embarassment of people looking at you funny or completely ignoring you when you say something that demonstrates you have no clue what the previous person actually said.

Regarding the “punch in the face” theory, I think the original quotation is from Heinlein: “An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.” If anyone knows better, please correct me.

This also reminds me of the persistent notion and over-abused “freedom of speech” claims by trolls who start getting their posts deleted, moderated, or even who are just warned. Sorry, when someone puts up a message board, they’re not giving you the right to say whatever you want without censorship.

It’s not you making a speech or personal opinion in the public sphere and the government clamping down on you, it’s you being invited into someone’s home who then later kicks you out because you’re trash-talking them or their family.

I dunno about the rest of you, but I tend to ban “first!”ers from whatever it is I happen to be in charge of. By now, it’s become kind of reflexive, and has resulted in more than one angry-email from some schmuck who didn’t have anything constructive or meaningful to say seeing the banned page.

Usually I just put block their e-mail afterwards.

But when it comes to “first!”ers I always get this image of someone sitting at a desk, drawing something in the old-fashioned way (pencil and paper) or writing something out (again, the old-fashioned way)… the guy finishes and holds it up in the air proudly, admiring it.

Suddenly, he hears something downstairs. His front door has been jimmied open, and someone is stomping — no wait, running — through his house and coming up the stairs. This intruder charges into his room, probably shoulder-checking the door open, and runs up to the artist/author and screams in his face at the top of his lungs:

Oh you are a CLASSY fellow. Not only do you delete two very civil responses I made to your accusations, but you make an entire blog post in an attempt to throw your spin on the entire thing. To be honest I feel rather special.

If you were any kind of reasonable intelligent person, you would have discussed this with me civilly. We could have resolved our differences without anybody being the “bad guy,” but you decided it would be more fun to vilify me.

This post will be screenshotted as well, since I’m certain you’ll be deleting it, just like the last two posts I made.

Link: I’ll leave this one up. You’re not civil at all. You’re insulting. I just keep hoping you’ll figure it out: I don’t care to spar with you. I even resent the time I’m wasting with this response.

I can tell you really need to fight, and I’m telling you there are better places on the internet to feed that particular urge. Take all the damn screenshots you want. Show them to the world. I don’t care what you do, just stop expecting me to host your insults.

Regarding the “punch in the face” theory, I think the original quotation is from Heinlein: “An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.” If anyone knows better, please correct me.

Well, sure. If you want to bring Heinlein into it…

In my experience, internet discussion forums are not lacking fistcuffs so much as the minor embarassment of people looking at you funny or completely ignoring you when you say something that demonstrates you have no clue what the previous person actually said.

Well said, David. I like your theory better.

I can’t count the times I’ve written a biting and witty response to some idiot or another on the net, only to erase it without posting. You wouldn’t give these sorts the time of day if they were standing in the same room with you spouting such nonsense, so why do it online? There are so many other places to go on the net…

Or, even better, to quote Marx (Groucho): “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside a dog, it’s too dark to read.”

Wow. And here I was worried that the nitpicker post might be aimed at me and my billboard metaphor. (I know; egocentrism of the internet – everything is about ME! But I meant to pick no nits – just trying to point out what I thought was an interesting and essential difference in the two situations – and I’d rather shut the heck up than ruin the nice little community here. Say the word.)

In any case, I feel better now, or at least less likely to be culpable; friend Link appears to have some serious anger-management issues.

Doesn’t anyone else have some good fish sandwich ideas? Come on folks, help me out here. The fish sandwich, if done correctly, has the potential to be a healthy alternative to a burger. So that’s a good thing, right?

I recall that a tin of plain kipper snacks on a plain baguette is actually pretty good.

Oh, and Fries. I do like fries. All types, thick, thin, curly, waffle, home fries, you name it.

So what are everyone’s favorite fried potato dishes?

Funny thing is, although I’m pro mayo (sorry to bring that up again!) on most types of sandwiches, I usually don’t like to dip my fries in mayo or salad dressing. I usually don’t dip into ketchup either. Just plain and salty.

By the way, I agree with Shamus, that Link guy doesn’t seem like much fun to deal with.

And Shamus, Scott Adams lives a few miles north of me. Maybe I could ask him why he likes to moderate flame wars? ;) I could bring my daughter and try to sell him some Girl Scout Cookies as a way to get him to open the door…

Hey, Girl Scout Cookies, those are good too! I like the peanut butter ones, how about you?

Can I get a shout out on favorite cookies? A bit less depressing than the “punch in the face feature”…

Okay, I’m going to get back to the work that I’ve been avoiding by typing this…

Since comments on the Pedantic Nitpicking post are closed, I thought I’d post this here since this post is vaguely related :)

For an interesting defense mechanism against the nitpickers, have a look at what Raymond is doing on the Old New Thing. It heads off some of the nitpickers while being amusing for the rest of us ;) [It doesn’t get rid of them all, of course. Nothing can do that.]